


The Cafe

by DrownedRedhead



Series: The Arts College [4]
Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Disaster Date, First Dates, M/M, art college au, cafe date
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-29
Updated: 2017-05-29
Packaged: 2018-11-06 08:55:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,242
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11032887
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DrownedRedhead/pseuds/DrownedRedhead
Summary: In which Tsukishima and Yamagushi finally manage to go on a date.





	The Cafe

Cat’s Eye Café is not, exactly, what Yamaguchi Tadashi had expected. Right next to the only gay bar within ten miles, he had expected something less, homey perhaps. Instead, the outside of the café has a small, fenced in area in front of the bar with two patio tables. The small, round complex of the new café, the gay bar, a flower store, a lingerie store, and a game shop is strangely homey in itself and Yamaguchi is concerned by that feeling. There’s grass and trees and flower bushes between the buildings and a small, bubbling fountain in the middle of the area.

The patio area of the café is very nice. The tables are the fancy, metal-that-looks-like-lace kind with umbrellas attached in the middle. Yamaguchi can’t resist the urge to crouch down beside one of the tables to inspect the designs of whorls that seem to make surreal flowers. He runs a finger along one curve, fascinated.

They haven’t even entered the actual café yet, but Tsukishima doesn’t seem to mind. When Yamaguchi looks up, he’s leaning casually against the fence with a tiny smile. Yamaguchi knows that smile, though not on Tsukishima, and it embarrasses him because it makes his heart flutter. ‘I’m happy to wait because you’re happy.’

Somehow, Yamaguchi is even more embarrassed by his detour into artists’ fantasy land simply because Tsukishima – his date! – doesn’t mind the wait. He straightens suddenly, brushing off his knees and not looking at Tsukishima.

The inside of the café is more casual than the patio. The tables are scattered around among video game memorabilia and racks of CDs. There are posters on the walls of everything from what Yamaguchi is sure is the Dutch prime minister – why on earth there’s a picture of the Dutch prime minister in a Japanese café, Yamaguchi can’t say – to concert posters and a huge picture of the Japanese national men’s volleyball team.

At the back of the building from the entrance is a clear glass counter with pastries in it smashed between a shallow counter full of drinks and the cash register. The door to the kitchens, probably, is right behind and the menu is on the entire wall beside in multi-coloured chalk. The wall must have been painted in chalkboard paint. It’s cute.

Yamaguchi trails behind Tsukishima up to the counter, trying to process the radically different inside and outside. Yamaguchi is startled out of his thoughts when the man behind the counter greets Tsukishima familiarly.

“Tsukishima! Hey, you actually came! You just missed the lunch crowd. The lunch crowd being fifteen people, but still.”

The man behind the counter is tall and wiry. His black hair looks like he just woke up ten minutes and had run his fingers through his hair in a vague attempt to make it better and had only made it worse.

“Mm. Yeah, I figured I might as well,” Tsukishima says, unimpressed by the other man’s enthusiasm.

“And you brought a friend!”

Tsukishima seems tired suddenly just by the short conversation. Yamaguchi gets the distinct feeling that Tsukishima doesn’t really want to introduce him, he steps up to the counter.

“Yamaguchi Tadashi,” he says, smiling slightly.

“Kuroo Tetsurou. Nice to see this nerd is making friends,” Kuroo adds, grinning at them. Tsukishima makes a face and Kuroo laughs.

“Alright, I’m done. Welcome to Cat’s Eye Café! What can I get for you today?” Kuroo says, suddenly perky for customer service. Tsukishima makes another face at him and looks over at the menu.

“Did you really make your signature drinks cat puns?” Tsukishima asks, flatly unimpressed.

“Yes, in fact we did. What’s the point of naming it Cat’s Eye without continuing the theme?”

Tsukishima sighs and eventually orders just a cappuccino, though Kuroo won’t put it on the tab until he orders a cat-uccino. Yamaguchi, after much thought, orders a Kit-Cat, which is in fact just a chocolate and caramel macchiato. Kuroo insists that they also share the Catastrophe, a huge plate of pancakes and bacon and sausages and hash browns and whatever other breakfast foods that Kuroo can think of in order to make the plate look like a cat.

Yamaguchi is quite entertained by it all, in fact. It’s a homey place with a happy enough management and eclectic interests; it appeals to him. He glances around again when Tsukishima walks away from the counter towards a table in the corner – away from Kuroo, Yamaguchi thinks – and is again impressed by the volume of just general clutter. He lengthens his stride to catch up to Tsukishima.

The corner picked out is in the corner beside the window and Yamaguchi gets the feeling that Tsukishima is naturally drawn to windows in a contemplative sort of way. Yamaguchi smiles and sits down opposite Tsukishima. The chairs are fairly comfortable but the table is freezing when Yamaguchi rests his hand on it. He snatches his hand back and sets it in his lap instead.

There follows a few moments of uncomfortable silence when each attempts to decide what to say. Is it okay to let a soft silence fall or do they need to speak, fill each other in on who they are, now they have the chance to sit down and get to know each other?

Yamaguchi breaks the moment when he looks around and gasps. On the wall is a picture of several people in sports uniforms from different schools. One is Kuroo and another is Tsukishima.

“You played sports?” Yamaguchi asks, excited. It was an added depth to the grumpy, stand-offish DJ and it made him strangely happy. Tsukishima blinks then turns to look where Yamaguchi is looking. He grimaces.

“He put that up? Yes, I played volleyball. I still do, sometimes, just not on a real team,” Tsukishima says. Yamaguchi lights up, laughing softly.

“Me too! I don’t have time to do anything anymore because I took a couple extra classes this year, but I used to play!” He stops suddenly, chewing his lip. He didn’t want to tell Tsukishima that he wasn’t great but he also wanted to be honest. Tsukishima stays quiet, waiting. “I wasn’t amazing, but I played fairly regularly,” Yamaguchi adds finally, trailing off a little. “I was mostly a pinch server.”

Instead of saying anything, Tsukishima just nods, taking his statement. No protesting of pinch serving being nerve wracking and incredible and no half-hearted reassurances that he was good enough to be on the bench at least. Yamaguchi is intensely grateful and releases some tension in his shoulders he hadn’t realised he’d been carrying.

“What did you play,” Yamaguchi asks eventually when Tsukishima doesn’t seem likely to continue the conversation without prodding. Tsukishima taps his fingers against the table and laughs, a wry, breathy sound.

“Block, of course. I’m okay at everything else, but I’m actually good at blocking,” Tsukishima says. Yamaguchi props his elbow on the table, ignoring the cold, and drops his chin into his hand. He likes this man. They’ve known each other approximately a total of a day and a half but Yamaguchi is sure that he wants to date this man. A new experience for him, to have such profound feelings so quickly.

“I appreciate your candour,” he says finally, smiling slightly. Tsukishima clears his throat and rubs his upper arm. He seems about to say something when Kuroo interrupts with their drinks.

“Your drinks,” he says, grinning in a way that makes Yamaguchi get the feeling the older man gets himself punched a lot. Tsukishima’s shoulder twitches in surprise but otherwise he only looks slightly irritated.

“Aren’t you a coffee shop? Shouldn’t you call out our names?”

“No, this is a café,” Kuroo replies simply, setting their drinks down. Tsukishima makes a face like he’d bitten into a lemon and Yamaguchi bites his tongue to swallow a laugh. Kuroo idles there, apparently trying to engage Yamaguchi with his eyes until Tsukishima glares him into leaving. Kuroo walks away with a long suffering sigh and Yamaguchi finally laughs.

“Did you two meet through volleyball?” Yamaguchi asks, peering into his mug. Tsukishima doesn’t answer for a moment, just leans on one elbow and wraps a hand around his mug. Yamaguchi doesn’t touch his yet, afraid it’ll burn. Finally, Tsukishima blows out a half sigh.

“Yeah. He and another just sort of adopted me during my first big training camp in high school,” Tsukishima says, tapping his thumb against the lip of the mug absent-mindedly. Yamaguchi nods and finally wraps his hands around his mug. It’s plain white and not actually as hot as expected. The drink is good too, though a little sweeter than Yamaguchi usually likes so he drinks in sips, pausing in between; it’ll probably last him the entire date, no matter how long they take.

They sit in a silence that Yamaguchi decides is comfortable during which Yamaguchi studies Tsukishima in sidelong glances and from under his lashes. Tsukishima doesn’t appear to be paying attention, staring at his drink apparently deep in thought.

It’s nice, Yamaguchi thinks, being here like this. It’s casual and not uncomfortable. Yes, he’s a little tense and there’s sure to be hiccups, but so far as ‘spur of the moment, ask a guy out’ dates go, he has to say this is probably one of the better ones.

The first hiccup comes in the form of the Catastrophe. Or rather, an actual, if somewhat minor, catastrophe.

Yamaguchi is entertaining Tsukishima with a spur of the moment story about the two people arguing on the other side of the window. She’s a dental assistant with a boss that won’t stop flirting, not that she’s sure she wants him to, and he’s her unruly best friend and roommate who’s just starting his Master’s in early childhood studies. They love each other, but they get into it a lot about silly things. This argument – loud enough for random words to be heard through the glass – is about how he leaves his college text books on the coffee table.

Kuroo interrupts with a platter that can only be the Catastrophe. And it looks like one, piled high with strawberries and whipped cream on a stack of cartoon cat face shaped pancakes. It certainly looks big enough for two, even two large men like they.

Just as Kuroo is about to set the platter down, the woman outside throws one of the chairs at the man. He dodges and throws his back pack at her but it’s too late because the chair has already gone through the huge window that they happen to be sitting about twenty-five centimetres from.

The chair does not hit either of them but it scares all three of them. The platter gets dropped and Yamaguchi ends up with a lap full of syrup, whipped cream, and various sausage greases. He also happens to be half falling out of his chair at this point, flailing and trying to keep a hold of the table to keep himself upright. Tsukishima’s eyes have widened but otherwise he doesn’t seem affected.

Kuroo, once over his initial surprise, is equal parts angry, entertained, and apologetic. Angry that the window just got smashed, entertained by the fact that this interrupted the date, and apologetic for spilling the entire, rather hot, platter into Yamaguchi’s lap, no doubt. Yamaguchi waves him off, muttering something about cleaning up by himself and the window.

The chair crashing through the window seemed to wake both of the arguers up and now they are both apologising fiercely to Kuroo as he climbs out of the now empty window. He shrugs and reaches through the window to grab the chair and says something that makes the woman laugh nervously.

Yamaguchi is unsure what to do about the food in his lap but it’s getting very hot on the sensitive skin of his inside thighs so he grabs the platter and attempts to scoop it off. Yamaguchi does manage to get it all off, with help from Tsukishima and a large amount of paper napkins.

“I am so sorry,” Tsukishima mumbles, though his face seems blank. Yamaguchi laughs and waves it away, though he studies Tsukishima’s face sidelong. His eyebrows are drawn together and up just a tick, not even enough to make a real wrinkle, but it’s there and the corners of his mouth are turned down just slightly. _His emotions are written all over his face all the time,_ Yamaguchi thinks suddenly, _if only you look closely._

“Don’t worry about it. At least these pants are black, right?” He laughs a little and the corners of Tsukishima’s mouth turn up in relief. Yamaguchi stands, brushing off his pants. “But, I think I should maybe put them in the wash. We could go back to my dorm for a moment if you don’t mind waiting.”

“Of course not.”

Kuroo is kind enough to put their drinks into to-go cups and they leave, trying to avoid thinking about what might just be the most awkward situation either of them has either experienced - at least on a first date.

The walk back to campus is drenched in awkward silence, half filled with city sounds but entirely empty of intimate chatter. Yamaguchi honestly can’t think of a stranger encounter, but he could definitely name worse, so that’s a plus, at least. Certainly not the worst date he’s been on, and oddly enough not the first date he’s been on where he’s needed to change pants.

 

**Author's Note:**

> I'm so sorry that I haven't posted this yet and honestly I might never post the next one simply because life sucks and my inspiration is gone and uni is starting to get intense for me and I just. :/ Sorry guys. Your support has been overwhelming and honestly it's helped me through a time where I didn't want to write at all. Sorry to have to leave it like this.


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